Wednesday, 24 November 2010

﻿ Ok then folks, welcome to Too Horrible to Die. This is a post with a double meaning, cause in addition to describing the current state of my blog, it also sums up the post's content! Woohoo! Check out how efficient I am (cause I'm quite pressed for time). :D

Right then, well, reasons this blog has been stagnant lately. Busy with work, busy with an exam for work (which was then moved to january, on the day I expected to sit it), been ill, deprived of sleep and Warmahordes. Mostly warmahordes and work, to be fair. Oh, and I GM'd a WHFRP session on saturday, which took up all saturday and sunday. So, busy times.

Anyway, onto this post. Tonight (and over the next few nights) I'm going to talk to you about things that're too horrible to die. This includes Hellpits, Hydras, "Super-Hordes", "Uber-units", general overspending, Margaret Thatcher, "Finesse units", FAAC gamers, Elitists within systems, BoLS Lounge, Forumitis, Michael Bay (including platinum dunes, leave shit I like the fuck alone), Transformers, Call of Duty, Halo, Gears of War, Assassins Creed, Army of Two, generic shooters, people going off topic and Stelek (c'mon, if he had any special rule it'd be Tactical Genius swiftly followed by Too Horrible to Die).

Ok that's a bit of an exaggeration, I'm not going to talk about all that. You could consider this a part of "You suck and this is why." It's pointing out some long lasting flaws and mistakes in the community of gamers, as well as some newer ones.

Ok so I'll start with Uber units. Now, Uber units and deathstars are two seperate entities. An uber unit is 12 blood knights with 5 vampires and all the trimmings. A deathstar is 50 phoenix guard with teclis and a BSB with the Banner of the World Dragon inside. Ok, let's talk about why people think Uber units are good, but why Uber units are actually really bad.

So you and your opponent deploy. You have your 12 KotBK and 5 Vampire unit, as well as 2 other units. He has 10 units. He places a cheap skirmisher unit, you place your cheap core choice. He places a cheap skirmisher unit again, and you place your 2nd core choice. Then he places a small-ish shooting unit, and you have to place your uber unit, meaning he can dictate the pace of the game from the get go. See how this is fun?

In addition, redirectors and the like really screw you something awful. Why? Well you have 1500pts invested purely into killing. What happens when they spend all game doing sweet fa? Yeah, I figured. No really, I did. In fact, this is a tactic I've used since 6th edition. See I played Summoning Horde, where I had more models than sense, and I could just put a small irritating unit of zombies in front of your unit. Or, if I felt nasty, raise a big unit and arkhan's it into your rear. Then your big killy unit was stuck against what is effectively nothing (compared to it's own cost) for a turn. Then you get another unit put in front of you next turn. And the next. And so on.

In addition, there's a certain element of overkill. I actually did a diagram on this a while back, will justifying my big units. There's only a certain amount of killy you need in a game, anything more is usually wasted. Unless you're fighting unbreakable units, or units that wont run. Right, if I'm honest, there's actually a fair point to be made here in that against mega-anvils you will probably want a lot of killy to burn through the ranks and unbreakable, you also don't want to spend too many points in that unit. It's about making sure you have enough killy and aren't just wasting points.

Now, I have to stop here folks, but I'll be back. I'm just doing as much as I can in the short times I'm not busy!

Stroke the epeen:

VT2 said: "Your site gives better advice on WHFB than Stelek"

He however quickly amended: "it's better because I can follow what's being said. Less "THE WATCHTOWER IS SHIT FUCK YOU AND GOOD NIGHT, YOU NOOB SEAL!!!!!" and more "this is shit, because..."" which is still a compliment. I think.

Loquacious said: "Wow. You're exceedingly clear, direct and effective in describing these phases. I completely and totally understood "The Wheel" even with your "erm." "